In my trials and trubulations (no this is NOT exact), I have found yellow lag indicator starts at around a 300-400 msec lag and red lag indicator around 500-600 msec lag. Lag in this case is the time for any info (like location infomation or guns firing) to get from client to server or vica versa. Lag includes the server load, the server internet pipe transfer time, the internet transfer time and the client internet pipe transfer time up to the time the client FL recognizes the info. The client FL knows these times and will light up the lag indicator as necessary.
So basically each of these things contributes to lag. I have found with maxxed (48k or 51k) speed on analog modems, broadband or anything better the transfer times are negligible. Why? Others with better pipe sniffing skills than I
found normally FL uses about 3-4 kb/sec bandwidth. This is well within the capabilities of good analog modems. During missions, cheating , large groups - anything that requires more info between the server and client that bandwidth can double or triple. This may result in dropouts of info where not all the info gets to its source. This eventually manifests itself as the j-e-r-kiness we see in NPCs (loss of info from the server) or other players (loss of info from other clients and/or the server).
Disclaimer: all of the above is to the best of my knowledge and subject to better proof than I have dug up
Start digging lads!
As long as you have a broadband connection, you should be fine. If you have the 56k connection, go to a place that tests transfer rates like
here at dslreports.com. They can give you an idea of just how good
ANY internet pipe is.
@cardamine.net, a gentle tease:
Have you been sampling to much of your product cardamine? There is no such thing as a P4 2400+
EDIT: Sigh, didn't like the j-e-r-k in j-e-r-kiness!
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Earendil
SysAdmin of Boston Freelancer server
Edited by - Earendil on 06-11-2003 16:38:31